KABUL, Afghanistan -- The Afghan presidential race is set for a June runoff between former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah and former World Bank economist Ashraf Ghani, according to official results released Saturday. The preliminary tally showed Abdullah winning nearly 45% of the 6.9 million votes cast, and Ghani 31.5%. Election officials will examine hundreds of reports of voting irregularities before issuing final results on May 14, but the allegations didn't appear widespread enough to change the results substantially -- or to give Abdullah the absolute majority needed to avoid a runoff.

President Hamid Karzai named officials on Saturday to oversee a parliamentary election, sealing a compromise with the United Nations and ending a damaging standoff with the West. Karzai's quarrel with Western donors over rules for September's vote led to a diplomatic shouting match with Washington this month that brought relations between the wartime allies to a new low. In Saturday's announcement, Karzai put a former judge and legal scholar in charge of the election commission, and also named an Iraqi and a South African to a separate election fraud panel, satisfying international pressure to include foreigners.

SACRAMENTO - It has come to this: California politics have become so one-sided that the only half-way intriguing statewide races this spring are for two largely ministerial jobs. One is secretary of state. The other is state controller. Both are pretty mundane. The secretary of state oversees elections and maintains public databases on campaign contributions and lobbyists' spending. The office also processes a lot of business-related stuff. Sounds simple. But under termed-out Democrat Debra Bowen, few things seemingly have been simple.

Thailand's main opposition party won a fractious election Sunday, paving the way for the nation's first female prime minister and the possible return from exile of her controversial brother, as disenfranchised voters laid down a new challenge to the nation's political establishment. Several hundred supporters mobbed party headquarters as word spread that the Puea Thai party, led by political novice Yingluck Shinawatra, 44, had secured 264 of parliament's 500 seats in preliminary results.

November 7, 2012 | By Scott Collins and Meredith Blake, Los Angeles Times

Fox News contributor Karl Rove ripped his network for predicting the winner too early. Some viewers thought ABC's Diane Sawyer was simply ripped. But TV's real winner of the 2012 election may have been … high-tech. Four years after CNN's John King unveiled the "magic wall" touch screen to illuminate electoral stats, TV coverage of the voting results Tuesday night was transformed into a celebration of the almighty little tablet. Everywhere viewers turned, analysts and anchors were manipulating touch screens and pinching and pulling factoids and graphics like Tom Cruise in "Minority Report.

Parti Quebecois suffered its worst provincial election defeat in 44 years on Monday, spurring debate throughout Canada on whether the party's signature goal of Quebec independence is dead. Politicians and pundits took to the airwaves Tuesday to proclaim the separatist movement an idea whose time has come and gone. Parti Quebecois won only 25% of the provincial parliament vote, weighed down by a prominent candidate's vow to stage another referendum on separation despite what pollsters say is a two-thirds majority of Quebec voters opposed to the idea.

Campaigning in Britain's most unpredictable election in years entered the homestretch Tuesday even as the nation began girding itself for a period of political uncertainty stemming from a potential stalemate in Parliament. The opposition Conservatives remain in the lead in the polls as they try to smash the Labor Party's 13-year grip on power. But there are increasing signs that no party is likely to emerge from Thursday's vote with a majority in the House of Commons, which would throw this country into murky political waters not seen here in more than 30 years.

WASHINGTON - Recent polls have pointed toward a victory for Republican Gov. Scott Walker in Wisconsin's June 5 recall election. But here's the clearest evidence to date that national Democratic party officials believe their side is losing: Democratic officials are playing down the potential impact. Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) insisted in a television interview that a loss for the Democratic candidate in the recall, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, wouldn't have any implications for other races, such as the presidential election.

City officials are starting to pore over thousands of signatures to determine whether a proposal for a Los Angeles city health commission could make it to the ballot -- the latest step in a battle by AIDS activists who argue Angelenos need more leverage over services provided by the county. The petition calls for a 15-member commission, appointed by members of the Los Angeles City Council, to monitor how county departments provide health services to the city. It would also examine whether the city should keep contracting with the county or create a health department of its own. The proposal emerged after a court struck down an earlier bid by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation to create a city health department, an idea that was vehemently opposed by city and county officials.

DAMASCUS, Syria - Presidential elections will be held in Syria on June 3, the government announced Monday, even as a mortar barrage on the capital highlighted the relentless violence in the country. President Bashar Assad is expected to run and handily win a third seven-year term, though new laws mean he could face a challenger for the first time. Assad has yet to officially declare his candidacy. The United States and allies calling for Assad to step down denounced the planned balloting as “absurd” and a “parody of democracy,” in the words of a tweet from Edgar Vasquez, a State Department spokesman.

Amid low expectations, it came as a surprise to Western diplomats when Russia signed off on an agreement calling for armed separatists in eastern Ukraine to lay down their weapons and surrender the public buildings they have been occupying for weeks. What hasn't been surprising in the days since is Russia's apparent unwillingness to ensure that those terms are quickly and cleanly enforced. Russian President Vladimir Putin has two objectives in what the Ukrainian and Western governments say is his thinly disguised backing of the separatists.

WASHINGTON - The Obama administration on Friday delayed a decision on the construction of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, citing a Nebraska state court decision that invalidated part of the project's route. The latest hold-up in the unusually lengthy review of the $5.3-billion oil pipeline almost certainly will push any decision until after the November midterm election, getting President Obama off a political hook. The White House has been pressed on one side by environmentalists who have turned opposition to the pipeline into a touchstone issue and on the other by conservative Democrats from energy-producing states who say approving Keystone XL would show the administration's commitment to job creation.

In the circus of speculation that surrounds Hillary Rodham Clinton and her presidential prospects, Chelsea Clinton dropped a bombshell Thursday with her announcement that she and husband Marc Mezvinsky are expecting a child. The former secretary of State has made no secret of her desire to be a grandmother, and sources close to her have said she would have serious reservations about diving into the grueling schedule of a presidential campaign if those demands coincide with her daughter's pregnancy.

Though the votes have not yet been counted in Thursday's presidential election in Algeria, the result is all but decided: President Abdelaziz Bouteflika will win a fourth term. Bouteflika's long reign is unprecedented (and unconstitutional), and so is the nature of the election. The ailing and frail 77-year-old Bouteflika had not made a single public or televised campaign appearance until this month's meeting with U.S. Secretary of State John F. Kerry, in which Bouteflika looked more dead than alive.

At the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department headquarters, a winding hallway leads to an unexpected oasis. Surrounded by trees, with a built-in grill and tables, the patio is an ideal place for a barbecue. Until recently, though, only a select few enjoyed it, smoking cigars and fashioning it into their own private hangout. In his first week as interim sheriff, John Scott announced that the cigar patio, as it was called, would be open to all employees. A contest would be held to choose a new name and smoking would no longer be allowed.

When California voters decided to change the way the state's primary elections work, the move was cast as an effort to moderate a state Capitol gripped by polarization. If the top two vote-getters in a primary faced off against one another in November regardless of their party affiliation, the reasoning went, hard-nosed politicians who typically put party purity above all else would be forced to court less partisan voters. That could mean more centrists elected to office, more political compromise and better governance.